FRIENDSHIP
When I wrote about old friends, I was silent about the meaning of friendship. I was writing about the reasons why old friends are sometimes more comfortable than new friends. But the concept of friendship itself is worth examining. Friendship is like love, but usually it's not as strong and not as emotional. Friendship includes affection, respect, confidence, assistance, and support but it doesn't require sublimation of one's own desires, it includes them. Unlike love, in my mind, friendship must be reciprocated, must involve mutual feelings.
Friendship is forgiving. Because friends know one another, including all the faults and foibles, they accept. Acceptance, understanding, forgiveness are normal in a friendship.
Friendship is eternal. Friends can fight, can be estranged, but no matter how long the friends are estranged, something of the friendship remains. The basis for the friendship, the feelings of affection and mutual regard, never quite die. And as long as these feelings remain, some spark of the friendship remains and can be rekindled. The bitterness which sometimes taints failed loves doesn't exist even when friendship is suspended.
Friendship is essential. While an asymmetrical love can be draining and destructive, friendship, which by its very nature is symmetrical, can only be constructive. Without love, one can survive and hope, one can even find the quest for love fulfilling. Without friendships, life is barren: lonely, hostile, deeply dissatisfying.
What is the basis of friendship? In men, friendship usually begins with some shared interest, often a shared love for a sport or a hobby. The shared experiences which follow often create a surprisingly deep bond. Then, after some period of time, this sharing ripens into friendship which transcends the shared experiences, which continues when there are no longer any shared experiences. In women, friendship seems to be based on something different, on intangible feelings of like and dislike, on various elements of personality and history but, once formed, female friendships are as deep and fulfilling as male friendships.
It's as difficult to seek friends as to seek lovers but it's easier to form friendships once we're sharing something and it's easier to maintain friendships once formed. The answer is activity: If we place ourselves in positions where we may find a friend, we eventually will. Then our lives will be enriched and so will those of our friends.
3-20-00
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